The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
I watched the matinee at the cinema today:
This was my favourite Narnia movie so far, although King Caspian sounded a little chavvy at times (his voice made me think of Naboo from The Mighty Boosh); I noticed that there was a lot of artistic license too, most of it wasn't too bad, though.
The scene where the Lucy, Edmund and Eustace got sent to Narnia was nothing like the book, but worked very well; also, I noticed that a lot of the plot elements were put in a different sequence, particularly the whole subplot with the land of invisible one-footed people.
The other two big differences in the story were the whole dream sequence where Lucy dreamed she was her sister Susan, and the fact that Eustace stayed as a dragon for about half the movie (the way they found out who he was was very different certainly to the BBC version from 1989, when he started to cry and Lucy recognised him (I don't recall if the book has him burning "I AM EUSTACE" into the landscape, but it seemed quite novel. The battle with the sea serpent was epic, although I certainly don't recall the book having Eustace saving everyone at the end (I guess the film makers thought it was a neat idea).
Tilda Swinton appeared again as the White Witch, who didn't appear at all in the book, and she was quite scary; I suspect they'll probably cast her as the "Green Lady" when they make The Silver Chair.
Overall, there seemed to be a lot of inevitable similarities to Lord of the Rings and Pirates of the Caribbean, but I liked the fact that they put a lot of humour into the movie (mostly at the start), and the kid playing Eustace was quite convincing as he started off as obnoxious, and then became likeable at the end. Reepicheep was probably the best character in the movie, and if I hadn't read it previously, I would not have guessed that Simon Pegg was doing his voice.
I'm looking forward to the movie of The Silver Chair a lot; it's probably the best of the Narnia books, and it had my favourite of the BBC adaptations, especially watching Tom Baker as Puddleglum; it would be neat if they cast him in the role again, though after 20 years they'd probably think he's too old for the role - I can imagine them casting Alan Rickman.
And I want to see the other Narnia books made into films; I loved The Magician's Nephew, the prequel to the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe - especially the whole room of "frozen people" where the White Witch gets freed from, and the concept of some sort of "overworld" full of lakes that take you to other universes.
I am thinking of seeing if I can download the whole Narnia series to my Kindle!
This was my favourite Narnia movie so far, although King Caspian sounded a little chavvy at times (his voice made me think of Naboo from The Mighty Boosh); I noticed that there was a lot of artistic license too, most of it wasn't too bad, though.
The scene where the Lucy, Edmund and Eustace got sent to Narnia was nothing like the book, but worked very well; also, I noticed that a lot of the plot elements were put in a different sequence, particularly the whole subplot with the land of invisible one-footed people.
The other two big differences in the story were the whole dream sequence where Lucy dreamed she was her sister Susan, and the fact that Eustace stayed as a dragon for about half the movie (the way they found out who he was was very different certainly to the BBC version from 1989, when he started to cry and Lucy recognised him (I don't recall if the book has him burning "I AM EUSTACE" into the landscape, but it seemed quite novel. The battle with the sea serpent was epic, although I certainly don't recall the book having Eustace saving everyone at the end (I guess the film makers thought it was a neat idea).
Tilda Swinton appeared again as the White Witch, who didn't appear at all in the book, and she was quite scary; I suspect they'll probably cast her as the "Green Lady" when they make The Silver Chair.
Overall, there seemed to be a lot of inevitable similarities to Lord of the Rings and Pirates of the Caribbean, but I liked the fact that they put a lot of humour into the movie (mostly at the start), and the kid playing Eustace was quite convincing as he started off as obnoxious, and then became likeable at the end. Reepicheep was probably the best character in the movie, and if I hadn't read it previously, I would not have guessed that Simon Pegg was doing his voice.
I'm looking forward to the movie of The Silver Chair a lot; it's probably the best of the Narnia books, and it had my favourite of the BBC adaptations, especially watching Tom Baker as Puddleglum; it would be neat if they cast him in the role again, though after 20 years they'd probably think he's too old for the role - I can imagine them casting Alan Rickman.
And I want to see the other Narnia books made into films; I loved The Magician's Nephew, the prequel to the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe - especially the whole room of "frozen people" where the White Witch gets freed from, and the concept of some sort of "overworld" full of lakes that take you to other universes.
I am thinking of seeing if I can download the whole Narnia series to my Kindle!